Conventional techniques for fabricating silver contacts often encounter some problems, notably:
Silver contacts are usually used in switches to establish conductive connection. When in use, the silver contact receives a strike from a connection leg to form a connection contact with the switch. The conventional silver contact is generally wedged in a housing space. When subject to striking over a prolonged period, the silver contact is prone to break loose from the conductive blade.
To remedy the foregoing problem, a technique has been disclosed to improve the fabrication of silver contacts in R.O.C. patent publication No. 448454 entitled “Method for fastening silver contacts of conductive blades”. It punches a fastening hole on a conductive blade that is concave on the upper side and convex on the lower side. Extra material of the conductive blade is extruded to form an extended wedging flange. The fastening hole has screw threads formed therein to provide a horizontal friction force so that the silver contact is less likely to break off. Finally, the top section of the silver wire is formed in a protrusive bucking flange through an upper mold, and a lower mold is deployed to ram the wedging flange towards the fastening hole so that the silver wire is filled and wedged securely in the fastening hole. The aforesaid technique can fix the silver contact more securely without breaking loose. However, in the design of switches, the interval between the movable contact and the closed circuit contact has to comply with safety regulations (for instance the interval under European safety regulations is 3 mm). The protrusive bucking flange will affect the distance between the movable contact and the closed circuit contact. Hence, the relative positions of the elements in the switch have to be rearranged.
Referring to FIG. 1, to resolve the problems set forth above, some people proposed an injection forming approach to embed the silver contact when the conductive blade is formed by injection. Such a design does not create the bucking flange, and the positions of the elements in the switch do not need to be rearranged. However, embedding by injection forming requires fabrication of new molds to suit the different contact sizes of various switches. Manufacturing processes cannot be modularized. As a result, manufacturing cost is higher.